 |
 |
 |
 |
| |
|
|
|
Shannon Pelini’s graduate research in the laboratory of Jessica Hellman, a professor in Biological Sciences, calls into question assumptions about the effects of climate change on biodiversity. Increasing warmth would permit northward expansion of organisms, many scientists presume, but Pelini’s work with two butterfly species presents a more complex picture.
“What I’ve found is our general predictions for how organisms are going to respond to climate change are over generalized,” says Pelini, who came to Notre Dame as a research technician in 2002, entered graduate school in 2004 and received her degree this year. The effect of extreme events on sensitive species and local adaptation, where the organism thrives in cooler temperatures, are among factors that could prevent easy expansion.
As a postdoctoral associate at Harvard, Pelini is part of a similar study with ants, a collaborative effort that includes researchers from the University of Vermont, North Carolina State University and the University of Tennessee. She hopes to run a lab that will study multiple effects of climate change at the community level. “We’re tying to push the envelope with climate change research,” she says. “There are so many other variables that change with temperature. I want to build out by adding more of these variables, and I want to build up by looking at changes throughout the food web.
|
|
|
